1. Field of the Invention
This invention concerns installation of mobile home structures and more particularly, the installation of mobile home structures comprised of a plurality of modular units which necessitates the lateral positioning of the units to align the same together for joining into a unitary structure.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Manufactured housing including "mobile" and modular-type manufactured housing has enjoyed considerable growth in recent years due to the great and pressing need for low cost residential shelter structures. Notwithstanding this relatively great growth, foundation arrangements and installation procedures for modular or mobile home units has remained relatively primitive. This is in part due to the origins of the industry, i.e., in the trailer or truly "mobile" home-type construction in which the unit was moved relatively often, and hence was emplaced in a relatively temporary fashion at each site. In most cases this emplacement was no more than putting the mobile home "on blocks," i.e., concrete block piers in which the trailer was jacked up and piles of concrete blocks were stacked beneath the mobile home frame to provide a platform. As the mobile home industry has evolved into a mass producer of low cost shelter structures, the foundation arrangements have not truly kept pace, as described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,125,975, which is a continuation-in-part of Ser. No. 556,969 filed Mar. 10, 1975.
The existing foundation arrangements have a great number of disadvantages in that there is not provided adequate resistance to overturning forces, the mobile home is typically supported at a relatively high position above the ground increasing the wind overturning forces and creating aesthetically unpleasing ground clearance necessitating the use of skirting. In addition, the support arrangements do not provide adequate resistance to shifting of the foundations by mud, freeze and thaw conditions, etc. In the aforementioned applications there is disclosed an improved foundation arrangement consisting of a plurality of telescoping stanchions which are mounted within the ground or above the ground in such a way as to be laterally stabilized, i.e., to be securely positioned against skewing movements of the stanchion, so that the stanchions telescope properly during installation thereof by being maintained in substantial parallel alignment with each other. This arrangement also precludes the imposition of distorting stresses on the mobile home frame which could be induced by skewing movements of the piers. This foundation arrangement has been found to be very advantageous and provides a superior, yet relatively low cost foundation structure which very admirably is suited to the low cost mass marketing structure involved in the mobile home business.
The platform support arrangements of the prior art led to certain difficulties in positioning and assembly of mobile home or modular housing structures with respect to each other at the site. These units are commonly shipped or transported in halves with the exposed or open end covered with plastic sheeting material, and at the site one of the units is placed on the platform, the other unit positioned with a clearance space therebetween sufficient to allow workmen to prep the units, i.e., to remove the plastic and make the necessary connections, etc. One of the mobile home units is then shifted into final position by the use of inclined jacks acting on a mobile home structure which acts upwardly and laterally on the mobile home structure to "shove" the mobile home over to the other unit and onto some suitably located vertical piers. The entire operation is difficult to control and time consuming to execute. In addition, it commonly imposes severe stresses on the mobile home structure which oftentimes results in damage to the structure. Furthermore, accidents are common due to inadvertent shifting of the mobile home structure.
It is thus an object of the present invention to provide a means for lateral positioning of mobile home structures on a foundation site.
It is another object of the present invention to provide such capability in which the movement of the mobile home structure can be precisely controlled.
It is yet another object of the present invention to provide a method and arrangement for laterally positioning a mobile home structure which does not impose excessive stresses on the mobile home structure.
It is still a further object of the present invention to provide such a method and arrangement which enables rapid and fail-safe positioning of respective units of modular or mobile home double wide units together in position to enable joining together of the units into a unitary structure.